Obesity is a serious medical condition. Complications associated with obesity include hypertension, diabetes, coronary artery disease, stroke, congestive heart failure, multiple orthopedic problems, pulmonary insufficiency, etc. Obesity can significantly affect quality of life and can result in a markedly decreased life expectancy.
To date, surgery is the only proven method for inducing substantial long-term weight loss in a patient. Numerous surgical procedures and devices have been developed to induce such weight loss, e.g., “stomach stapling”, the Roux-en-Y (“The Roux”) bypass procedure, the vertical banded gastroplasty (“VBG”) procedure, etc. However, all of the known surgical procedures and devices developed to date for inducing weight loss in a patient suffer from one or more significant disadvantages.
Accordingly, a new method and apparatus is needed for inducing weight loss in a patient.